Babies, Blond(e)s and A Very Big Bang
by SassyJ
Summary: AU. Raylan is clueless, Tim is irritated and Rachel has something up her sleeve besides her arm. Raylan's poor girlfriend selection skills come into play again and Tim cooks. Suddenly his co-workers know too much, and he has a squatter on his couch. Tim Gutterson decides it's time for some home and away truths.


"It's a baby not an IED."

Tim shot Raylan a fierce scowl. "I know what to do with one of those. And who's the father here anyway?" Raylan went all still and quiet, like he always did when he was pissed. Tim didn't care, it needed saying. Even Rachel was pussyfooting around on the damn subject, so Tim leapt in where everyone else apparently feared to tread.

Seeing as Raylan was going to just stand there like a dumb-ass-statue, Tim got down on his hands and knees and crawled under the battered table, it wasn't as though they were going to be able to take a chance on moving any of the furniture, there was enough junk balanced all around to bury the little one alive.

She was small, and Tim figured older than she had first appeared through the gloom and the dirt. Her dress may have been pink at one time, now it was faded and so filthy that it looked grey, from the smell, nobody had changed her in quite a while.

Tim kept his voice low and soothing, talking nonsense to her. She seemed to take to that. She wobbled upright on her feet, sat down hard a couple of times, then she crawled the couple of feet into Tim's lap.

"I'll call Alison." Raylan's disembodied voice registered as Tim tried to reassure the little one that everything was going to be okay.

"Yeah, you do that." Tim muttered under his breath. He didn't have much of an opinion on Raylan's new girlfriend, only that Raylan was a trouble magnet, and something seemed off about Alison.

Tim had survived two tours in the theatre of war by listening to his instincts (and doing what he was trained to do), and his instincts said that this new blonde in Raylan's life was trouble. He also figured that he really wouldn't be this pissed off at Raylan if he didn't like the guy. If he and Rachel weren't as tight with Raylan as they were, Tim figured he would just let the shit fall.

It pissed him off even more that he did care. The guy was like the brother Tim didn't have.

Whoa. That was definitely going a place that Tim didn't want to go. He hadn't laid eyes on his sister Elizabeth since coming back from basic. And that was the way he wanted it to stay. He really wasn't in the market for siblings.

Lifting the dirty child into his arms, he tried not to mind the sour smell of her tiny unwashed body. The little arms wound around his neck, sure she was grubby and smelly, but the level of trust in this tiny little body… well, Tim really didn't get why Raylan was missing out on this.

He tried very hard not to think too much about that, partly because he wasn't a father, and the whole father thing…

"Tim." Raylan had that confused look on his face, or it might have been indigestion seeing as it was Rachel's turn at the coffee pot that morning. Her coffee sure messed with y'digestion if y'let it.

Tim reined his crazed speculations in a bit and concentrated on Raylan's confusion, which had morphed into irritation.

"Alison is on her way." The cowboy stuffed his phone back into his pocket, and put his hands on his hips. That expectant look, the one that made Tim crazy, on his face again.

"Don't s'pose you found anything we can clean her up with?" She really was filthy, and the diaper was unpleasantly full. He could feel that without looking.

Raylan actually backed up a step. Tim widened his eyes, and then rolled them for full effect, "well one of us needs to look, and" he nodded to the little girl, "kinda got my hands full at the minute."

Raylan put his hands up. "Okay, no need to get cranky, I'll look." He virtually scurried away, leaving them alone. Well not quite alone. Despite the aroma, Tim pulled the little one close, put his hand up to curve around the back of her head and more importantly shield her view of the remains on the couch.

Her mama.

Or at least what Tim and Raylan had assumed was her mama. LeeAnna Watkins. Pretty, or she had been before whatever had happened to her, as dumb as a box of rocks, another Ellen Mae, mother to a small daughter, and sometime common law wife of one Patrick Easton. Easton was quite probably even stupider than LeeAnna, or maybe not… he wasn't anywhere to be seen.

And LeeAnna was stretched out on the couch, sightless eyes staring at the ceiling, from the unpleasant smell, and the mottling of her skin, dead at least two days.

"We need to find food for her, Raylan." Tim called back, as an after-thought. He looked into the wide blue eyes, she could be more than eighteen months maybe but probably not, her eyes told a nasty story of neglect and abuse, so he wasn't surprised she wasn't screaming. Even though she had to be starving hungry and possibly very thirsty too. Learnt early on that crying would be ignored was his guess.

Tim held her tighter. "Can't keep calling you her?" Tim said the first female name that popped into his head. "Lucy." The baby tilted her head, "yeah… Lucy."

"One diaper, and nothing else useable." Raylan reappeared carrying a plastic packet with colorful printing on the side that said they were a cheap generic from a branch of a chainstore.

"Lucy needs food, and to be clean and changed, we can't wait here another hour for your girlfriend." Tim really didn't care that he sounded snappy, the little girl deserved better.

"Local PD will be here in a minute. They can watch the place. We can go get Lucy some things. Okay?" Raylan shook his head a little and mouthed _Lucy _a couple of times. Tim ignored him. Baby needed a name.

Local PD arrived, and Raylan went to talk to them, while Tim got himself and Lucy into the backseat of Raylan's Town Car.

Five minutes and they were heading to the nearest Kroger's, and Lucy had discovered Tim's Marshal badge, clipped to his ballistic vest. It kept her entertained, little fingers rubbed the star and the circle in surprisingly precise movements. Tim really didn't know whether to be intrigued or disturbed by it.

At Kroger's they acquired a basket, enquired where the baby aisle was, and headed in the right direction. The sheer mass of things ranged on the shelves brought Raylan to a halt, Tim waited patiently for his partner to stop dithering.

"Oh for…" Tim handed Lucy into Raylan's unwilling arms, snatched the basket, and started grabbing things. Diapers, wipes, cream, food bowl, utensils, Tim was grabbing jars of baby food before Raylan had time to think.

"We…" Raylan trailed off. "How… do you know this stuff?"

"Not my first neglected baby." Tim's terse statement informed Raylan that questions would not be wise. So he hang on to his smelly and somewhat squirmy bundle and trailed after Tim to the clothing section. Dress, socks, sweater and jacket went in the basket, followed by a sunhat, then apparently they were done.

It was when they joined the nearest and shortest queue for the counter that Tim realized they were the subject of some serious scrutiny. They were both wearing their ballistic vests, two clearly armed and ready Marshals in the company of a small, grubby and pathetic looking child. Tim took in the round eyes, and barely concealed whispers, and decided it made sense to play the US Marshal card for all that it was worth.

He wasn't fond of the whole hero thing, but if it got them some help and a place to clean Lucy up and get her changed and comfortable, well so be it. He pinned his most winning smile to his face, and enquired if there was a changing facility anywhere nearby, because the poor little mite needed changing. Neglect may have been mentioned, and Tim played it like a pro, though the word rescue never fell from his lips.

In a few minutes they found themselves in the employees' washroom, with a baby bath, several towels, and some nice warm water, and Tim introduced Raylan to the joys of bathtime.

It was truly bizarre, Raylan decided, the things one learned about one's colleagues. That somehow despite being barely more than a kid himself, Deputy Marshal Tim Gutterson apparently knew more about babies and how to handle them than the baby-daddy himself.

All this competency in the face of mixed emotions and baby neglect was confusing Raylan. He knew what kind of father he didn't want to be. Sadly, he seemed to have gotten the wrong end of the stick again. If a confirmed bachelor a dozen years younger than himself, like Tim, could get the whole baby thing down so easily and confidently, it made Raylan look like a complete loser.

No better than Arlo.

A headache took up residence somewhere just above his right eye.

"Food." Tim said, happily drying Lucy off.

Raylan watched his younger, childless partner handle the whole bath/dry/dress routine like he'd been doing it all his life, and felt panicked.

Cleaned up and dressed up, she was a cute little thing, which only served to make Raylan more acutely aware of everything in his own life. Everything he was doing wrong, but seemed unable to stop himself.

Tim looked up, Raylan was actually blushing, and his eyes looked the unhappiest Tim had ever seen him. A very small part of Tim's soul rejoiced, maybe Raylan was finally getting it; but a bigger slice couldn't help feeling sorrow that it was like this for Raylan. God only knew Tim's family had screwed him up, but whatever Arlo, and Helen, and Raylan's mother had done to him just seemed worse somehow.

"Food." He repeated firmly, before he could get drawn into the whole romantic cowboy tragedy standing there in front of him. Knowing on that score it was far too late. That he, Tim Gutterson, late of North Carolina, late of the US Army Rangers and currently residing in Lexington, Kentucky, had bought into the whole Harlan Cowboy mystique, hook, line and sinker.

"Food." Raylan repeated, looking a little like he had never heard the word before. Oh great. Raylan wasn't exactly tracking, so Tim took charge. Picked up Lucy, thrust her firmly into Raylan's arms, cleaned up the mess, steered Raylan towards the exit, thanking the staff profusely for their kindness and assistance, threw the bag of baby stuff into the Lincoln, swiped the keys from Raylan's unresisting fingers, slid into the driver's seat and pointed the car in the direction of where he knew a Cracker Barrel to be.

Ten minutes later they were seated at a table, Tim having secured a high chair for Lucy, and staring at the menu when Raylan finally snapped out of it.

He looked up. "Huh?"

Tim rolled his eyes. Though that was the default response to Raylan most times. "Cracker Barrel, lunch, remember."

"Alison."

"I texted her from your phone while you were sitting there in a daze." Raylan was starting to glare, so Tim went on, poking the possum was just too impossible to resist. "Don't s'pose y'remember me peeling you out of y'vest either."

Raylan scowled, "as I recall, I had my arms full of Lucy at the time. All you did was undo the straps."

Tim's grin was one of his finest, smug smirk. "see y'do remember."

Their waitress was just behind them, "don't worry," Tim was truly on a roll right now, "she thinks y've taken one too many blows to the head."

"What?"

Tim's eyes were on the menu, missing Raylan's _y'dead_ glare. So Raylan turned to the woman, fixed her with the full blast of courtly Southern charm and proceeded to lay siege.

Tim sat back and watched.

One thing he had learnt early on, Raylan Givens in full charm mode was an irresistible force. Their waitress was certainly old enough to be Tim's mother, possibly even Raylan's, but the cowboy had her eating out of his hand in nothing flat.

Tim sighed inwardly, and yielded with a small grin.

In short order food arrived, chicken for Raylan, country ham for Tim, and and something for Lucy that was supposed to be baby-friendly.

Lucy stared at the food in front of her, round-eyed. Raylan raised an eyebrow at the tight expression which crossed Tim's face.

"I'm guessing developmental delay."

Raylan nodded, he didn't really know what that actually meant for Lucy, but he knew enough about poverty and poor parenting to hazard a guess what Lucy's life had been to that point.

He could even get behind Alison's unorthodox methods to get a child out of a dangerous house. For a moment he wondered where he fit on the sliding scale of fatherhood, between deadbeat and below average he guessed. But what if he turned into Arlo?

"Y'think y're Arlo?"

Raylan wasn't aware of expressing that sentiment out loud, and he really didn't quite know what to do with Tim's question. He stared at the younger marshal.

"Y'really think that y're gonna be Arlo?"

Raylan reached for his default setting for when anyone got too close, anger. But somewhere his blue touchpaper wasn't firing.

He had no witty or pithy comeback. He was out of options, running on empty and they had just hit zero, and Tim was waiting for an answer. Or something.

A tiny spark flickered somewhere, "why'd you care?" He could hear the challenge in his tone, but Tim's expression never changed.

"Damned if I know."

They stared at each other, Raylan shrugged.

Tim simply gave him the look, slumped down in the chair, Tim at his most relaxed. Apparently. Lucy's fingers grabbed carrots and squished, and they watched as she smeared the handful around her mouth, chortling in glee.

"Somewhere in this whole mess, I guess I was looking for someone to break the cycle. Prove me right, and that arsehole Boyd Crowder wrong, but I think I'm gonna be waiting in vain." Tim's country-boy accent faded to nothing, and the blue eyes drilled into Raylan's.

Raylan almost flinched from the hard honesty in Tim's eyes. He wasn't a role model for anyone, least of all the sniper, and the weight of expectations was dragging him under.

Tim shifted, reached out for the spoon next to Lucy's plate, and began to feed her. "What would I know, I'm an idiot."

To Raylan it sounded less like self-recrimination than some kind of obscure warning.

They were still in Cracker Barrel when Alison caught up with them. Lingering over coffee, and the ice cream that Raylan just had to have, which Lucy seemed to recognize as a food group, and made grabby hands, so Tim got her one too. Tim just settled for a coffee.

He watched Alison approach, Raylan had his back to her, and there was just something in her face that didn't sit right. His instincts said that this woman was off, but Raylan was in something with her, so Tim said nothing. Absolutely no sense in making Raylan angry for no reason, it wasn't as though the cowboy was going to listen to Tim's concerns.

Apparently everything was fine up until the moment that Tim tried to hand Lucy over to Alison. The baby went rigid in her arms, the little face crumpled and Lucy's screams rattled windows.

There was this hard look on Alison's face, as she virtually dumped Lucy into a childseat in the back of her vehicle and strapped her in. Tim handed over the bag of things that he'd bought.

He suspected that Alison figured that he wasn't overly impressed with her. If the somewhat frosty expression and the way she suddenly clung to Raylan's arm was any indication. Tim walked away, better to step away from Lucy, so he didn't hear the pleading little whines. The baby did not like the social worker.

That was okay. Tim didn't like her either.

The drive back to the office was filled with terse silence. Tim had had enough, Raylan's suspicious glances and the tight line to his mouth said that he was bursting to snarl at Tim because of his new shiny girlfriend, and Tim was not going to play that game.

Knowing he could outlast the cowboy, Tim simply did nothing. Stared out of the windscreen and watched the miles zip by. Raylan in a mood was likely to be seething all the way back to the office. Fine.

Raylan rolled to a stop, looking for a parking place, and Tim was out of the car before Raylan could do more than blink. Okay, so that was a little childish, but Tim figured he had done and said more than enough already, he wanted to get in, write his report, evade questions and just go home.

A couple of beers, cook something… Tim mentally reviewed the contents of his fridge. If Art and most of his colleagues wanted to view Tim as a victim of the war, one step away from hopeless alcoholism who could barely take care of himself, well that was just fine. Tim handled his demons by facing them down. In private. Not that he didn't have them, but he sometimes wondered how the rest of the office thought he made it into Glynco and through training if he really was as busted up as they clearly thought he was. The privacy thing began a long time before the Army, and he recognized the signs in Raylan too. So pot meet kettle.

Not that he couldn't drink like a fish, and not that sometimes in the dark and the dead of night, the horrors of the things he had seen, and sometimes done, didn't come to him. Not that looking down the scope at someone he might have to take a shot at didn't bring a certain tightness to his throat, or a scramble of horror images. Tim might not be an Army Ranger anymore, but he was still a soldier, and he didn't miss.

Duty. He would take the shot or the people he was there to protect would die. That was something that Tim could not live with, failure. He owned his experiences, he'd seen too many men, friends, acquaintances, and sometimes enemies like Colton Rhodes, fall through the obvious cracks. That came from not owning your experiences. That came from folding, and Tim would never fold. He'd made that promise to himself a long time before Basic.

Tim Gutterson would never be his father.

He got to his desk, wrote his report, took two copies for the files, having exactly no doubt that Art would moan about his handwriting again. Slapped the piece of paper inside the file, and tipped the file into Raylan's in-tray before the older marshal could say anything.

It was shift end, Tim had timed it perfectly, Art looked like he wanted to wax fatherly and peculiar, and talk about feelings, which was the very last thing Tim wanted. Raylan was fuming at his desk, trying to type at speed, which was so not Raylan's thing. Tim grinned to himself, if the way Raylan was hammering the backspace key was any indication there would be another new keyboard in Raylan's immediate future.

Tim leaned around the door of Art's office. "Night."

Art beckoned. "Tim…"

"Sorry boss, hot date." Tim pitched his tone at the right balance of longing and regret.

Art sighed, "go on." He had his doubts, Gutterson had been with him for over two years now, and no one knew a thing about his personal life. Mullen just hoped that it wasn't a bottle, though he thought it probably was.

Tim flicked a cocky salute at Raylan, who virtually snarled in return. Tim was definitely on a roll, and there was a trip to Kroger's in his immediate future. Rachel was still out, so Tim gave a general goodbye to the office and headed out.

He hovered in the produce area at the largest Kroger's near his home for a long time, mentally reviewing his recipes and testing out in his mind what he really fancied. He gathered up the makings of boeuf bourginon, selected a bottle of red wine… marinade the meat overnight, that was an awesome recipe, his mouth was virtually watering at the thought.

He was back in the aisle contemplating the various merits of button mushrooms versus oyster and shiitake, when he became aware of a presence. A brooding, irritable presence just behind him.

"Are you going to just stand there and glare?" Tim didn't even turn around, knowing that would annoy Raylan even more. There were times when he simply couldn't help himself. "Or is this some weird way that you're inviting yourself to dinner?"

"Dinner?"

Tim turned around. "Dinner." He said with exaggerated patience, annoyed with himself. He had planned a nice, quiet, flavoursome evening with good wine and a good book, and now he had somehow managed to issue an invitation to dinner to the one person who was guaranteed not to bring peace and tranquility along with him.

The scowl eased up on Raylan's face, and he gave a little nod. Verbal communication was not Raylan's strong suit, even though he could talk the backside off a donkey if he was motivated. Sometimes Tim wondered about the dichotomy that was Raylan Givens, terse, introspective, gregarious, flirtatious, angry, none of Raylan's attributes seemed to actually add up. And his personal choices?

Tim decided not to go there, he just shifted in the general direction of the condiments aisle with Raylan following behind him. Tim could feel the cowboy's eyes on him as he selected individual spices, and smirked quietly to himself as he figured that Raylan's food choices were take out or something ready-made that could be zapped in the microwave. Under normal circumstances, Tim would be working with fresh herbs, but he was out, and the new growth wasn't quite ready.

He did wonder what he was doing here, letting Raylan in on something about himself that not even Rachel knew, even though they had spent quite a lot of time together outside of the office. Rachel had even been to his place a couple of times, though she had never looked inside the grubby brown expanding file that sat in one corner of his kitchen counter.

However observant Rachel was, she would never cross the line with Tim, and he kinda relied on that for keeping his secrets. Raylan, different matter, Raylan was observant and the usual social niceties of not prying were somewhat beyond him. Raylan could play the Southern Gentleman to the hilt, but that was all part of the act. The courtly charm did not cover sticking his nose in where it wasn't wanted or needed.

And Tim just had to go and invite him.

By the time they reached the checkout, Tim was wondering if they took separate cars whether he could deliberately lose the older marshal on the way home. However when it was Tim's turn to pay, somehow Raylan had stationed himself at the end of the counter, so when Tim's stuff went through, Raylan was packing it.

Tim fought the urge to roll his eyes, and just hoped that things weren't too badly crushed when he got them home.

The bill was some thirty dollars more than he usually paid, and Tim pondered the extra, realizing that he had somehow automatically factored Raylan into his purchases as soon as the cowboy had shown up.

He knew then that he wasn't going to lose Raylan on the way home. Inwardly cursed at himself for being an idiot, opened up his Yukon, taking the six stuffed bags from Raylan put them in the trunk.

"F…" He was about to tell Raylan to follow him, but he realized that Raylan had taken the opportunity of Tim's distraction to settle himself in Tim's passenger seat.

"Thought I'd come with you." The hazel eyes twinkled as though the cowboy had read Tim's mind and had no intention of being abandoned along the route.

Tim kept his face impassive and shrugged. "Fine." He slipped into his seat and turned his truck towards home.

Having Raylan Givens loose inside his inner sanctum ratched Tim Gutterson's anxiety up a notch or three. Not that Raylan was especially a slob, but Tim liked his things in their place. He had kinda hoped that Raylan would sit. But no, Raylan prowled. While Tim opened his recipe file, and tried not to mind that Raylan had finished with the living space, and had started on the kitchen.

Tim already had the ingredients for dessert on the go, and he actually flinched when Raylan dipped a finger into the edge of the Kitchen Aid bowl. "Dammit, Raylan…" he shot Raylan an evil glare, "do you want to lose fingers?"

Raylan shrugged, and sucked the finger, his eyes had a twinkle, and Tim tried very hard not to think about how he managed to look as sexy as hell, and about three years old at the same time. "Mmmmm tastes good."

"It will taste even better without the addition of blood and human flesh." Tim tried very hard not to think about one of his childhood friends. Tommy was always into everything, until the day he lost the index and middle fingers from his right hand in his mother's food mixer. And Tommy was right handed. Sure he'd adapted, but a lot of the things he could have done were not really an option anymore, and it had impacted his life.

"Bad memory?"

Tim pulled himself together. That was a place he definitely wasn't going. Images of his past before the Army were a no fly zone for anyone. He placed the steak in a dish and then covered it liberally with red wine, and the herbs he wanted to season it, before covering it with cling wrap and sticking it in his fridge.

"Beer." It wasn't a question. Raylan reached past him and snagged two from Tim's supply. "Shiner Bock… Nice!"

Tim popped the lid on the beer that Raylan handed him, and took a swallow, set the bottle down carefully, and turned the stove on. "Okay, any allergies that I don't know about?"

"No." Raylan was leaning against the fridge, smirking a little.

"What?" Tim raised an eyebrow.

"It's just…" Raylan took a swig of his beer, "unexpected." He tilted his head a little, studying Tim closely. "Surprising."

"Well this ain't the Spanish Inquisition." Tim reached for the meat. "Slow cooking this makes it tastier, but since I know you are not a big fan of waiting, lamb tagine with chickpeas and apricots."

"Sounds good."

The Kitchen Aid came to a halt, and Tim transferred his dessert mixture into his prepped dishes, and slipped them in the oven.

It was weird, but in a good way, Raylan decided. Watching Tim, the guy really knew how to cook, and it was fascinating to watch as he sliced and diced with knife skills which were completely beyond Raylan.

The cowboy felt something of a heel just standing there, after all the reason he was dining with Tim started out as just another way to wind the sniper up a little, some small payback for the suspicions that the sniper clearly had about Alison. Following him to the store, and then watching him pick ingredients as though he was checking a recipe in his head. Raylan had to admit that what had started out as an attempt for some sort of payback, morphed into considerable curiosity on his part. Finding out that Tim could cook, and apparently very well indeed, well that was jackpot first time out.

He started out thinking about payback for Tim's comments about his distinct lack of fatherhood skills too, then moved through Tim's obvious competency and ease of use with Lucy, and ended up not wanting to leave it there when Tim said goodnight in that nonchalant way of his. So he had followed Tim.

Now he was standing in Tim's kitchen, instead of back at the Monroe Palace with Alison, and Tim was still calling him out on his lack of contact with Willa.

The truly strange turn of events, he really didn't want to be at the Monroe mansion with Alison. He wanted to be right there, waiting to see what culinary marvel Tim was going to produce from that strange shaped pot on his stove.

"It's a tagine."

"Huh?"

Tim rolled his eyes and continued putting ingredients together. "Moroccan cook pot… it's what you make this recipe in."

To Raylan, whose culinary skills extended to stab with fork, and pull tab, it was as though Tim was suddenly speaking a foreign language.

"So why…" He waved his bottle at Tim's badge that was sitting on the table next to the couch.

Tim took a moment before answering, then shrugged, it wasn't as though that part was some big mystery. "I got out of the Army," invalided out, but Raylan didn't need to know that, "and it's what I do well. So…"

"You seem to do this well too." Raylan's levels of articulacy were not improving, but Tim got the drift all the same.

"This is relaxing. If it was the way I was making my living, it wouldn't be relaxing."

And Raylan had to admit this was the most relaxed he had ever seen Tim.

The food was amazing, the meat melted in Raylan's mouth, the warm spices bursting with flavour and the texture, Raylan was definitely in food heaven.

Tim just gazed at the blissed out look on the cowboy's face, and carefully concealed his amusement. Raylan really was a simple creature sometimes. He was just glad he'd made enough for seconds.

The peach tartlets with homemade (vanilla) ice cream were a hit too. Certainly enough to make Raylan flop on the sofa with a groan of appreciation.

Tim made coffee, while Raylan sprawled in that negligent, irritatingly sexy way that no doubt had blondes falling all over themselves to get with that. Tim just wished that Raylan would grow a clue about the motives of predatory blondes and pass, preferably before it got him into yet more trouble. Tim had had a lot of the story of Raylan's poultry woes from Rachel. It was dumb, and infuriating, especially as Rachel and Tim couldn't help themselves, they just had to help him out.

They had coffee, and Tim watched the older marshal sink down slowly into Tim's comfortable sofa cushions, heard his answers become more monosyllabic, watched eyelids droop over sleepy eyes and knew that getting Raylan back to his own bed was a lost cause.

He was going to be damned uncomfortable if Tim didn't fix that too. Tim took a deep breath. Not his first time undressing a drunk/sleeping colleague either.

He removed the cowboy's tie, unbuttoned his shirt, debated removing it, decided not… Tim had plenty of henleys that would fit, unbuckled his belt, removed his boots and then began the heave-ho-tug routine to get Raylan out of his jeans.

Raylan actually had the temerity to start snoring just as Tim was lifting his slinky hips to haul the jeans over his ass. At that point the sniper couldn't decide if it was funny or he was really, really pissed.

Finally the jeans were off, Raylan's boxers had a bizarre pattern on them that Tim assumed must have been a present, because there was no way in hell he could see Raylan buying that for himself. He covered the cowboy with his spare quilt, folded his jeans neatly, put his boots together and straightened out his socks.

Raylan slept through it all.

_Worn out from the sexual gymnastics_ was the nasty thought that ran through Tim's head.

"Y'welcome." Tim tipped a snarky salute at the cowboy, noticing unwillingly that Raylan Givens looked younger and a lot less troubled sleeping on Tim's sofa than in all the time that Tim had known him. He tried not to find that endearing.

Tim's cell vibrated in his pocket, and he pulled it out, saw that it was Rachel and moved into his bedroom before answering. "The Gutterson Home for Stray Givenses."

"I wondered where he was."

"Y'need him?" Tim pushed his door closed, "hope not, because y'shit outta luck if y'do. He's asleep."

Rachel made that noise. Tim pulled the phone away from his ear and glared at it. "No. He's sleeping on the sofa. Damn near ate me out of house and home too." The one dinky little personal secret that Rachel did know was that Tim was bisexual. And that a certain lanky, troublesome, uncontrollable cowboy had been pushing all of Tim's buttons since the day he had got to the East Kentucky Office.

Right now Raylan wasn't just pushing buttons he was leaning hard on the one that said "F.U." Tim had literally had enough of the Givens' charm and the avoidance of the issues at hand. For the sake of the friendship that he believed they had, Tim was going to drag the cowboy to the water… and partial drowning was not out of the question if he didn't drink by himself.

"Tim… you are making no sense." Rachel's voice sounded tenderly amused and Tim realised with a blush that he had unleashed his mixed metaphors on her.

"Yeah, maybe." Tim pulled himself together. "So what does he owe you this time?"

"I don't know yet."

Somewhere along the line, Tim and Rachel had taken the train wreck that was Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens and turned him into their personal project. It was sad, and irritating, but dammit, if Raylan wouldn't watch his own back, Tim and Rachel would.

"Why do we do this, Tim?"

"Damned if I know. It's not like the bastard is ever grateful." Tim didn't mean to sound that pathetic, but seriously.

"But you care anyway, don't you?"

Tim snorted at that, taking exactly Rachel's point, "And I suppose you don't." He said.

"He gets under your skin."

"He needs a boot up that skinny ass."

"Thought you liked Raylan's ass." Rachel could say that. Tim had mad sniper skills, and some fairly impressive ninja ones too, but Rachel was a woman, and Tim was smart enough not to even dream of trying to cross a woman. They could do things… Tim repressed a shudder, "As if…" and side-stepped the question, trying very hard not to think about the perfect, firm ass that you could definitely bounce quarters off. Raylan had a great body. Way too great for a man of his age, and it was conceivable that there was a fair amount of envy in Tim's response.

Dragging his thoughts away from Raylan's gorgeous looks, and trim, lean, well-muscled body, currently stretched out on Tim's sofa, Tim and Rachel traded back and forth for a little longer, and then hung up, with Tim none the wiser what she had called him for in the first place.

Several miles away Rachel Brooks put her cell on charge, and smiled to herself. Extracting Raylan from the clutches of one predatory blonde, and into the arms of another, entirely different, kind of blond was the mission, and so far so good.

Even if it never became a thing between them, Tim's determination to make Raylan see sense about his daughter and what his future could be would be better for everyone concerned.

There was that song about never leaving Harlan alive, Rachel Brooks was determined to break that cycle for Raylan. There was a life beyond the petty crap and low expectations and violence. She could see that. The cowboy had slipped under her skin, they were both fond of him, and now that she thought she knew what the end game might be, they were both determined to save Raylan.

He had escaped once before, this time Rachel Brooks and Tim Gutterson were there to help him do it again.

[][][][][][][][]

Tim knew he was in for a hard time of it. Raylan had woken up antsy, fallen on breakfast like a starving cur, if all a starving cur ate was a bagel with cream cheese and copious amounts of black coffee. To the extent where Tim wondered if Raylan's quick draw was actually down to the caffeine jitters.

The grey Henley he was currently sporting beneath the check shirt were both Tim's, a fact that Art apparently knew… If the sly smirk that the Chief Deputy was wearing was anything to go by.

Rachel and Nelson were both rocking the "I Know What You Did Last Night" look. Which Tim might have been okay with, except he hadn't and wasn't.

And Raylan Givens was still an asshole.

Totally playing up to all Art and Rachel and Nelson's bizarre marshal stiffy fantasies.

The puppy-dog eyes were simply the end. Tim leaned close to the partition. "You even want a sniff of the beouf bourginon, you will knock it off right now."

Raylan didn't bat an eyelid, but toned it down immediately.

Somewhere in the corner of Tim's very orderly brain the minor snippet of information concerning Raylan Givens and his possible grasp of French was neatly filed away under Apparently Useless, But Good To Know.

Under Useful, and Definitely Good To Know, was the information that Raylan's latest squeeze, Alison, was not as white as she appeared.

Unfortunately, this was not unexpected. Tim pondered Lucy's reaction to the social worker the day before, and started doing some digging. Raylan was going to be pissed, possibly most of the rest of the office including his boss were going to be pissed, but Tim couldn't help that. There was something wrong with a social worker when a baby like Lucy was actually frightened of her.

Come shift end, Raylan was being impossibly nice, and when Rachel bought him his favourite coffee from the shop down the street, Tim started to catch on that maybe his secret was out. He looked at the two hopeful faces and sighed. "Fine." He said, realizing with not a little irritation that when he put the slow cooker on that morning, he had factored Rachel in to this little feast.

"Fine." Tim shut his computer down, without waiting to see if his hungry co-workers were following, he headed out into the night.


End file.
